Comment by MertsA | Hacker News Reader

Comment by MertsA | Hacker News Reader

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How would switching to macOS provide any protection against an APT? Against Malware in general yeah sure but against the NSA or FSB in a targeted attack I don't see how that benefits you at all. If the NSA can put the screws on Microsoft then Apple should be no different. Apple refusing the FBI is one thing but faced with a gag order and an NSL their only recourse is to appeal to a secret court that basically always sides with the government.

Also as of late it seems like macOS has been nothing but security incident after security incident like the recent bug where encrypted disks had a password hint of the decryption password or when somebody found out that the system preferences app was basically using an undocumented API that had no authorization at all and gave root access. Or that keychain vulnerability that gave complete access to the entire keychain to anything running in a web browser!

I think an APT would have a field day if their targets started using macOS.

Everyone who think they are safe using macOS should see this presentation : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7VZtCUphgg

Patrick Wardle has reversed the C2 com protocol and found it had "advanced" capabilities (remote exec, key and mouse sniffing, screenshot, etc.). The malware was found on several thousands Macs too (mostly in the US).

Apple pays people to "astroturf" that they're immune from Viruses and backdoors. IMHO, that makes them much worse than Microsoft.

Any suggestion a good tools (good source one) on mac that can scan and detect this kind of malware?

the guy in the video has created a bunch of "osx sysinternals" tools for this exact purpose : https://objective-see.com/products.html.

Well, nothing's totally secure. You can but reduce the odds of having problems and Macs seem to be hit less. For example in the N Korea hack on Sony the Macs survived https://9to5mac.com/2014/12/18/sony-hack/

>“Some people had to send faxes. They were dragging old printers out of storage to cut checks,” she said. “It was crazy.” ... "People using Macs were fine,” she said. She said most work is done on iPads and iPhones.

Perfect is the enemy of good and all that.

>Macs seem to be hit less.

Yes but my point is that this is completely irrelevant to an APT. When an attacker moves from opportunistic to targeted having an OS with a lower adoption rate isn't going to matter. They aren't going after the most amount of victims possible, they're going after you specifically.

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